Even though the EULA accompanying the beta build of Windows 7 prohibits the publication of benchmark results (good luck enforcing that one, Redmond), everybody and their dog will still compare the Windows 7 beta to Vista and Windows XP. Adrian Kingsley-Hughes is one of those benchmarking the beta, and according to his results, the Windows 7 beta beats both Vista and XP in just about every scenario.
Instead of running Crysis or benchmark suites, Kingsley-Hughes decided to go a different route and perform 23 common tasks on each of the three Windows versions (all 32bit), and then simply mark the winner, the runner-up, and number three. He performed the same 23 tests on these Windows versions on two different machines: an AMD Phenom 9700 2.4GHz system fitted with an ATI Radeon 3850 and 4GB of RAM, and an Intel Pentium Dual Core E2200 2.2GHz fitted with an NVIDIA GeForce 8400 GS and 1GB of RAM. While I personally don’t have a system nearly as fast as either of those, they are hardly top-of-the-line configurations.
The results are telling. On the AMD machine, the Windows 7 beta beat both XP and Vista SP1 on 21 out of the 23 tests. The results were the same for the Intel box: 21 out of 23 tests went to Windows 7. While Windows 7 tripped on the installation of Office 2007 and DVD burning on the AMD box, it tripped over two file moving operations on the Intel machine.
There are, as always, issues with these tests and the data they produced. First of all, there are no absolute figures for any of the 23 tests; we don’t know if Windows 7 beat its predecessors by a huge margin, or only by a barely statistically significant one. In addition, I found the tests to be a little vague, as the author doesn’t supply the files he used for his tests – in other words, we can’t reproduce his exact steps.
Despite these obvious deficiencies, these results confirm the general feeling you’re getting from those who have already tested Windows 7: it seems like Microsoft is delivering on its promise to make Windows 7 no more resource demanding than Windows Vista – in fact, it seems to have overshot its goal by making Windows 7 perform better than its illustrious predecessor, which is nothing short of a miracle in Windows land.
Remember, though, that your mileage may vary.
The good news is that Vista outperforms XP.
There is insignificant evidence to show that here, since XP and Vista’s scores are so close (61, 52 and 56, 57). Without the actual figures we don’t know if, for instance, Vista beat XP by small amounts in the tests where it was faster, but XP beat Vista by large amounts in the tests where it was faster.
The conclusion that 7 is the fastest is mostly valid, since it was fastest in nearly every test.
Would be nice if he posted the actual figures for his tests, so we could see how much the speed difference is.
Also test 1, installing the OS, is mostly irrelevant since it is something that is done a couple of times in the computer’s lifetime, if that (most Windows installations are done by the manufacturer). As long as it doesn’t take a ridiculous amount of time, who cares?
Ive been using it full time for about a month now, and it is noticeably faster then vista, but not much more then that. Where it really shines is boot time. It is faster, and doesn’t do that thing where vista thrashes the disc for 5 minutes after boot up.
You can take what I say with a grain of salt though, cause on my hardware I can’t really tell a difference in performance between xp and vista.
thrashing discs for 5 minutes ?! lol – go buy a new disc.
Huh, that was difficult !
Sir that is reprehensibly untrue.
In the land of open source, all we do is continually reinstall operating systems. Its common knowledge that unless its a server (as those things have been running continuously since there were dinosaurs roaming silicon valley) the OS has an average lifespan equal to that of teenage girl on a first date.
All you have to do is look at any review of any new open source OS release. The first 9 of 10 pages are how nice the installer is and all the features you can choose between. The last page is usually a summary of what its like to boot the system for the first time.
After that is time to reinstall a new operating system. They don’t come out and say this as everyone already knows that’s what your supposed to do.
We don’t actually use these systems for real work, thats a big no no. BeOS was the last OS made that was intended to be used for real work and look what happened to it. So we’re just not going to repeat that mistake again.
What on earth do you do to girls on their first date? Whatever it is, I’m putting it down to user error.
Incorrect, depending on who you are. In support roles, particularly for larger or higher turnover organisations (e.g. salesforce), the installation time matters greatly.
It seems like thoughs benchmarks are as useless as a chocolate fireguard, all the numbers you see are 1,2,3 and Windows 7 shows halving the performance of Vista and XP.
Looks to me now that both Snow Leopard and Windows 7 really are service packs with performance tweaks, I’d rather keep my money thanks(not that I would buy them but from a outside stance I wouldn’t).
Edited 2009-01-03 14:34 UTC
I know for Snow Leopard you are mostly right. It has been touted as the “laying a foundation for the future” version.
A chocolate fireguard isn’t entirely useless. You could always eat it
You are right because most innovation is done under the hood (APIs, Performance Tweaks, etc…)
You are wrong because those new APIs will allow application developpers (including Apple) to channel those new APIs into NICE applications.
As an Application Developper myself, I will probably buy it
How the hell does Snow Leopard become involved in this as a service pack?
The kernel, filesystem, user space and application sets from Apple are moving to Cocoa. How is that a service pack?
Errrr, because users don’t give a damn about Cocoa, it isn’t going to make any direct difference to them and it is purely a developer thing that Apple cocked up?
Hmm, I wonder who developers are developing for then…
That’s a very good question considering that most third-party developers are extremely reluctant to do anything with Cocoa owing to the fact that there is zero return on investment for them in rewriting apps with it.
Edited 2009-01-04 22:25 UTC
I’ll believe it once I see it with my own eyes.
I also hope they’re going to soften up a bit with the DRM-stuff.
Edited 2009-01-03 15:00 UTC
The “DRM stuff” amounts to being able to play blu-ray and hd-dvd legally. I really hope they don’t remove that capability.
i hope they do
the movie-industry would have to choose between giving up on drm or loosing 95% of the pc-market
“The “DRM stuff” amounts to being able to play blu-ray and hd-dvd legally. I really hope they don’t remove that capability.
i hope they do
the movie-industry would have to choose between giving up on drm or loosing 95% of the pc-market ”
The DRM is not going away, in Windows 7 aka ‘Vista Me Edition’ or any Windows edition.
With the current Economic outlook Corporations are not going to migrate to Windows 7, or even Windows Vista Business. With Companies barely holding on cutting jobs/cost all over the place. Microsoft has put itself into a ‘quandary’ of being expensive, hard to maintain and licensing costs to bankrupt any small operation. I think the dot-com-blowout from 2001 is coming again in the a Tsunami wave, it will take out small Tech companies and downsize some MEGA-Corps like Microsoft because the money is not there to buy it.
I believe a lot of companies will be cutting IT budgets and software not really needed to be upgraded quite frankly will NOT be and the MONEY needed to upgrade to Windows vista or Windows 7 is not going to happen. This is a marketing plan to try to lure people into the MS non-stop license payment plan. It would be different IF Microsoft did not have insecure software by design. Windows requires a Anti-Virus client, REAL Firewall, and some type of desktop central management in a Company environment. The ROI is not there to constantly upgrade, spend tons of money on re-writing in house applications, and tons of money on new hardware.
In perfect economic times I am sure it would not be an issue, and it would be good for the economy with all of the new products being sold. However, this is not going to get better tomorrow or next year.
The next Computing man-made disaster will be energy consumption, with the ‘self made oil fiasco’ the computing sector will be under the gun. With Obama’s COAL TAX it will bring very high energy bills and it will crash out the electronics sector the same way they did it with the Auto sector. With Obama quotes of people should not be able to turn the thermostat down to 74 degrees is a fire across the bow shot.
The entire server/desktop methodology will be under fire, and when the Coal Tax powerplant electricity prices go into affect you will see what happens to new hardware purchases and how it will tank the industry.
This is coming and the warning shot since people voted for a guy who says to run the country off of a windmill, walk to work and eat by candle light it will be an interesting to see how the United States is turned into the United Socialist States of America.
I think the USSR was a fine example of how Obama plans to help out people who want something for nothing and the ridiculous Global Warming Swindle that is a FARCE.
Big Government will save you with lots of taxes for working people and freebies for people who cry because they don’t have what someone else has because they do no work and will not work…
Man centos_user, you don’t make any sense.
1. Suggesting that coal power is good is absurd. So you say that consuming a limited resource, releasing greenhouse gasses, and causing acid rain is somehow good?
2. Alternatives to coal power are not really that expensive. Nuclear and hydropower are almost the same price and are much better for the environment. Even those hyped-up “green” sources of energy that those Greenpeace lobbyists are pushing are coming down in price.
3. In the grand scale of things, computers use very little power. In cold places (like Canada), one can even argue that computers are 100% efficient because the power that computers use is simply turned into heat, reducing our heating bills.
4. When did Obama tell you to “run the country off of a windmill, walk to work and eat by candle light”?
And then you go on to claim that Obama’s a communist. Come on, how absurd can you get? You think that pure capitalism will solve our problems? Well how did we get into the hole we’re in right now? How did the “laissez-faire” strategy work in the Depression?
Please stop trolling centos_user and only say something if you know what you’re talking about.
Haha, before I’d take anybody seriously who claims Obama is a communist, I’d suggest Barack take his head out of Wall Street’s ass first. This guy is a first class kleptocrat, just look at the appointments for economic affairs, Summers, Geithner, folks like that. Kleptocrats pur sang.
it’s the same old crony capitalism: privatized profits and socialized risks. It’s the same idea behind freddie mac, which is what tanked the economy in the first place.
and, what is he doing using an OS based on Socialistic development principles? [Tongue in Cheek]
Yeah, I’m sure he’s really a Castro agent. 😛
[*using CentOS as well..*]
What have you been smoking?
Obama is for sure no “Socialist”, neither Soviet-style nor Hugo Chavez-style.
In Europe he would be seen as center-man who listens to everybody, including the green party.
Regarding your opposition to a CO2 – tax:
With oil and coal production nearing its peak, we are facing steep price increases for those resources. With accelerating climate change we are facing more storms, more floods and longer dry-periods.
We now have two choices: Start a changing process early, use the CO2 tax to finance the industry change and profit later from not having to sell everything, including the kitchen sink, to Saudi-Arabia.
Or go on like before, and take a rather hard wake-up when the time to pay is coming.
Please get some facts. One of them is, that humankind will SOMEday have to live without coal or oil. Nobody can say NOW when this will be (it is likely a few hundred or thousand years away), but we better try to shift those times as far away as possible.
The second fact is, that 50 to 100 years from now we will produce 60 – 80% of our electricity from solar power. Because with Chinese and maybe African peoples also coming closer to US and European standard of living we will have no other choice. We will of course still have coal, gas and oil power plants, but they will be backup machines for long winter nights and cold periods.
Whoever is technology leader on solar power plant production will profit the most. Currently Germany has the best financial environment for building solar power plants, which is the reason why more than 50% of current solar panel production world wide ends up in Germany (they have only 100 million inhabitants). When an American company invented a printing process for solar cells, guess what happened? That company built a production facility in Germany. Germany gained jobs which could have stayed in USA. And the solar industry is growing FAST, with the fastest growth still to come.
And regarding your scepticism towards climate change:
1) The climate IS changing. There are just SOME people who want us to believe that humankind has no influence in this climate change.
You will find NO climatologist who says that the climate is NOT changing.
2) All mathematical climate models I know of are “wrong”. “Wrong” in the meaning of inaccurate, because not all influences are included or fully understood.
Each of the models was tried out in two ways: Once with human-made greenhouse gases included, once without including them. ALL of those models got by far better accuracy with human influence included. Not a single model was able to simulate the currently happening climate changes without the human-made greenhouse gases.
Is that proof? No. Not in the sense like 1+2=2+1 is provable. It is a strong indication of what is most likely the case.
You could jump onto the freeway directly in front of a truck approaching with 105 km/h. Most likely you will end up dead, but alas, as long as you don’t actually jump you have no prove that you will be dead.
I am in favour of trying to avoid that jump, even if it costs us some effort. Compared to what costs we have now from the deregulation of the markets during the last 10 years, the costs of getting the solar, wind, wave and water power train running on its own steam are peanuts. Unluckily the times when we have to pay both of them coincide, and that is the REAL difficulty.
I can only congratulate the US population to have voted for a pragmatist and communicative president who seems to have the ability to get most people to pull into one direction.
removing is pointless. If you never play a protected HD disc you are never affected by the DRM support. The movie industry doesn’t care about those who play discs on their PC as the vast majority don’t.
The “DRM stuff” could also include the Windows Product Activation. Although admittedly it does work almost all the time, its a pain when you have a retail version of XP and your motherboard gets fried in a power surge and you have to phone a call centre because the hardware has changed since Windows was last installed.
No it refers to “Premium Content” They have already also stopped the recording of TV programmes. Thats ignoring all the other nasty things like tilt bits, and don’t even pretend you haven’t read it in detail
No, they certainly have not stopped the recording of TV programs. Where do you get this nonsense?
I record TV shows in Vista regularly.
I play all kinds of illegal HD movies. Vista doesn’t stop you from doing anything.
archer75 astroturfed
From Microsoft themselves perhaps?
Microsoft confirms Windows adheres to broadcast flag
http://news.cnet.com/8301-10784_3-9946780-7.html
Maybe you’d prefer some of the other articles on this?
NBC-Vista copy-protection snafu reminds us why DRM stinks
http://arstechnica.com/news.ars/post/20080514-nbc-vista-copy-protec…
Broadcast Flag rides again, courtesy of NBC & Microsoft?
http://www.engadget.com/2008/05/18/broadcast-flag-rides-again-court…
Broadcast Flag Triggers Vista Refusal To Record?
http://www.managingrights.com/2008/05/broadcast-flag.html
Microsoft’s Masters: Whose Rules Does Your Media Center Play By?
http://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2008/05/microsofts-masters-whose-rules…
And those are just the first few results in Google.
If you prefer to be ignorant and lose control of your computer, that is certainly your right, but please don’t condescend to those of us who keep ourselves informed and would prefer to retain control of our computers.
–bornagainpenguin
he just said he does it all the time, and then you rip into him for being ignorant and uninformed because he thinks he can do it?
google_ninja spouted…
No, he mocked the other poster and implied what he posted was impossible.
Just because archer75 has yet to be bit by it does not mean the DRM does not exist, poised to strike at the order of outside forces.
I call him ignorant and uninformed for claiming Vista doesn’t stop you from doing anything when clearly this is not accurate.
–bornagainpenguin
PS: Why don’t you try looking at some of those links in my previous post and consider in the light of those whether or not Vista doesn’t stop you from doing anything.
Softening on the DRM I doubt will happen, afterall they created it and the market for it don’t forget.
Does Windows 7 eliminate the annoying “(Not Responding)” message where a window freezes for a while or we have to wait for it retrieve a directory. Consistently this happens with a MSFT product one too btw, like IE, WMP, or explorer windows). It never happens with iTunes, or other third party programs, just the MSFT ones they have integrated into their horrid OS.
I played with it for a few days and started to use on a daily basis. I can not compare it to XP, but it is definitely faster then Vista. And UT3 never crashes under W7 (under Vista I can not play warfare…)
I looked at the tests and thought what crap!
The built in compression tools are horrible. That’s why I install 7zip. Networking faster? Ok, but then again I don’t transfer 2 gigs per hour.
What I have been witnessing, and it bugs the heck out of me is that with each version of Windows more and more garbage is running in the background.
I find it ironic that Windows needs to constantly read files to know if they are infected, or need indexing. Microsoft could build those hooks in so that we don’t have a process looking at 1 Terrabyte of data.
Faster networking would be warmly welcome by me.
These tests are a little misleading. For older systems with a gig of RAM or less Vista would not outperform XP. There is a reason my Eee 1000H came with XP, it works better with less RAM. I am certain that Vista 7 runs nicely on a 4 Gig system. In some ways Linux outperforms XP. Applications open/close faster for me on Xubuntu than XP. The low overhead of the desktop environment, in terms of memory, also is a factor.
That is an excellent point, that seems to be lost on many reviewers. What will Microsoft offer up on netbooks, if it kills off xp?
The smart money would be on taking the XP codebase, sprinkling a few features from 7 and calling it something other than Windows XP.
Maybe you’re joking, but do you really think it works like that?
Why wouldn’t it? Microsoft have something that works on Netbooks and that customers want (XP). Vista is already known not to be suitable and Windows 7 is likely to be equally unsuitable, so what real choices do Microsoft have?
They can’t just sell XP for ever more: their entire business model relies on releasing new versions of their software every so often. Selling XP alongside Windows 7 isn’t going to happen.
It’s a simple operation to take the XP codebase, warm it over with a few tweaks and a small visual update and then release it as something “new”. They get to sell their “new” Netbook OS alongside Windows 7 and XP gets EOLed. Where’s the problem?
Edited 2009-01-04 00:12 UTC
Netbook manufacturers have said windows 7 would be shipping on netbooks by the end of next year
Yes, but only because they won’t have any choice in the matter when XP is EOLed. Lets wait and see how well Windows 7 works on the average Netbook.
Strange, my Aspire One has been running Vista just fine for a very long time now. No problems whatsoever. Didn’t have to turn anything off.
If the next Syllable meeting is in The Netherlands again, I’ll pop in and show you.
Sure, you can install Vista on your Netbook if you like, but the fact that Acer do not offer Vista as an option should give you an idea of weather or not “Runs on one” and “Suitable for many” is the same thing.
We’ll see. Will you take up on my offer? Shall we meet during the next Syllable meeting (assuming it’ll be in NL again), so I can prove to you that Vista is running fine on my netbook?
I need to cover one of the Syllable get-togethers anyway
.
If the meeting is in NL it’s unlikely I’ll be there I’m afraid.
I don’t doubt it runs, but Acer obviously do not consider it suitable for their own hardware.
C’mon, get real here. Nobody should be using less than a gig of RAM with any next-generation operating system; whether it’s Linux, Windows, or OS X.
Eh? Latest Ubuntu runs relatively fine on 256mb RAM old laptop. Even better with Xubuntu. I don’t see why a desktop OS has to eat more and more ram. It’s not logical considering that we’re not really adding much functionality in the base system.
The only reason RAM requirements go up for these things is because programmers are lame and add layers upon layers of “frameworks” and other crap (and I’m a programmer so don’t go haywire on me) instead of creating things properly. This is the same reason why things are still so buggy even with the new paradigms we use today.
I personally do no jump high with joy if I see that my system boots and shows me a HUUUUGGGGEEEE value for free/unused/uncached RAM, it is something a lot of people look at and feel bad if the number is not close to 90% of your system RAM as if by itself would be the best metric of all.
Resources are not there to be left unused. To keep the PS3 console analogy, I would be really pissed if the XMB felt incredibly sluggish, had a DOS style graphical interface, were under-featured, could not play music, videos decently, etc… because you were saving up RAM and processor cycles to run a game which was not running YET as if it somehow touching non game code would make them unclean and unworthy of being used again.
Up to a point, the OS should use all the resources it needs to provide the smoothest, richest, and most useful experience to its users and give back those temporary resources (we have virtual memory for a reason!) when an application demands it (example full-screen game).
Take and give back, take and give back…
We are running multi-tasking systems, not single-task punch-card based machines…
Edited 2009-01-04 09:54 UTC
Panajev declared…
The problem is, to the experience of the average user Vista takes but doesn’t give anything back…(or at least if it does, the system takes way too long to do so. Maybe its stuck playing with virtual memory, trying to decide what to swap out?)
In any case, if you need virtual memory on a system with over a gigabyte or more of RAM you’re doing something wrong, and most machines running Vista have at least a gig coming right out of the gate!
–bornagainpenguin
That’s not my experience… if we want to compare subjective metrics…
On my system (HP Pavilion dv6775) Vista x64 SP1 feels snappier and has less moments of dramatic performance loss compared to my Fedora 10 set-up with KDE 4.1.3 and the latest nVIDIA driver (considerably newer driver [180.17] than what Vista uses [170.08]), especially with more and more applications running.
Nothing to take away from the Linux kernel advancements, Fedora’s improvements (right now the 32 bit release supports everything I have and need HW wise and SW wise… OpenJDK works well, Flash and Acrobat Reader install nicely with yum, PulseAudio and the KMixer work well [much better audio playback], enabling gnome power manager even under KDE I get control of my screen brightness level using the Keyboard’s FN keys back, Touchpad is not too difficult to customize, WiFi management even under KDE is a breeze now thanks to Network Manager being very well integrated… I am just waiting until I can get the same smooth driver+software mix with the x64 release [probably I will try a default x64 set-up again with Fedora 11, was very displeased with Fedora 9 x64]), and KDE4 improvements…
A lot of under the hood work that has to be commended, but as a user I must also value my experience on this side.
One thing I was almost forgetting to mention… I merely said… not declared
…
Anyways, Virtual Memory is kind of very much needed to play the Take+Give back game I was mentioning and for it to be worthwhile IMHO… buffers could be temporary and erased and built-back-up again, but that would be a waste of HDD accesses and processor cycles. Also no matter how little RAM the OS might reserve/cache (Linux does it too) I might be wanting to use some of that RAM as well and if during the time my application runs that area of memory is not touched/needed there won’t be any wasteful paging in and out of data.
Edited 2009-01-05 12:31 UTC
Panajev pointed out…
That’s part of the problem right here with these kinds of discussions–it ends up being highly subjective.
How am I supposed to convince you the evidence of your own eyes is wrong? Or you convince me of the same?
I must ask if you’ve compared the performance of Windows XP to Vista or Linux on that machine, and what you noted the difference to be?
–bornagainpenguin
I am more sensitive than others to interface responsiveness and glitches/artifacts/refreshing issues (tearing, aliasing, etc..) and besides some issues with Vista RC1 and the nVIDIA drivers at the time (once in a while everything would stutter) I was pleased with Aero and still am (the only thing I like in compiz/kwin better is the expose’/coverflow ALT+TAB window switching over Flip3D which I find to be the poorest of all three in terms of usefulness and “coolness”
).
XP was not slow, just less “responsive” GUI wise IMHO, under CPU load it would stutter, slow down a bit more than I’d like it to. Plus Vista has several other features which I really like (better WiFi management, explorer’s bread-crumbs [Dolphin is COOL, but still Eclipse-like in its waste of screen real-estate IMHO], etc…).
(like pretty much a lot of what Vista provides, besides file copying and extracting files from .zip archives [which just got better with Vista SP1], but for the latter 7-zip exists)
My first Vista set-up was an ACER laptop with a 1.67 GHz Core Duo, 1 GB of RAM, and a GeForce Go 7300 with 64 MB of dedicated VRAM and the moment I had to put XP back on it (for my father) I was missing Aero/Vista DWM a lot… On such a set-up I used to run (I have a screenshot, somewhere, to prove it
) Internet Explorer, Firefox (several tabs), Visual Studio 2005, Virtual PC 2007 (256 MB of RAM assigned to it) running Windows Server 2003 which was running IIS 6, and Microsoft SyncToy… it was not a nightmarish experience either 
.
I am running a beefier set-up now (1.67 GHz Core 2 Duo, 3 GB of RAM, and a GeForce 8400M GS with 256 MB of dedicated VRAM), but I still prefer Vista over the alternatives although Fedora+KDE keeps improving at a very fast pace, but it still is not there yet (even CUDa development wise, the fact that nVIDIA does not have a GPU memory manager there yet means I have way less VRAM available than I’d like to on KDE4/GNOME+compiz
)
I agree that it’s nice for software to be able to scale up and down, as needed, but your statement that it “runs relatively fine on 256mb RAM” is highly debatable. It depends on what you’re doing with the software. Sure, if you simply boot the machine, and leave it idle, fine. Or run a simple document editor. But you’re not going to be able to do any video-editing, for example, play Crysis, or use it to drive a HD home theatre. Even browsing the Web with Firefox can easily chew up a hundred megs of memory, and your poor little box is going to do nothing but page, page, page, page, page.
I am certain that Vista 7 runs nicely on a 4 Gig system.
Perhaps you should take a look at linked article. They used 2 systems: with 4 and 1 GB of memory. And Win 7 wins both times.
Is this a fair comparison of like-for-like just because they are all versions of Windows? What about the performance on the hardware they are built for compared to other operating systems at the time? Windows 7 might be expected to eat gigs of ram more efficiently than Vista or XP but should it take over a gig of ram to run an operating system in the first place?
The original recommended system requirements of Windows XP in 2001 were 300Mhz CPU and 128Mb RAM. Try testing XP, Vista and 7 on those machines. Windows 7 might be faster on modern machines but I bet it eats up more resources.
Just because it is getting faster on ever-faster more powerful machines it doesn’t mean efficiency is increasing too. “Benchmarking” isn’t as comprehensive as some think.
That is so stupid.
Windows 7 is designed for more modern hardware than Windows XP, Windows XP won’t take the same advantage in modern hardware as Windows 7, and Windows 7 doesn’t care to run well in 2001 hardware.
Hmm… I don’t know…
Given the economic climate at this moment and in the foreseeable future, it is very unlikely even a small company will purchase new hardware very soon.
Given the fact that most company’s are still using hardware that is capable of running Windows XP but absolutely not capable of running Vista or something similar (an not going to upgrade as I explained above).
Given the fact that Windows 7 is tested on-, and designed for- new hardware, and this test was done on this hardware that is obviously not representative for the huge majority of company’s
Then… I think this test are nice, but no indication if Windows 7 is usable in anything but this test environment. If you include the factors given above a very different image will appear. I really would like to see some test on equipment that is going to used at this moment and in the near future. That is in my opinion the only test that give a real indication of usability…
Depends what field you are in. Last week my whole team got upgraded to quad cores with 4 gigs of ram and dual 7200rpm hard drives (which everyone promptly put into raid 0)
You are basically arguing that any benchmark is irrelivent unless it is done on hardware that is impossible to buy now because it is so obsolete. we are talking about a 3-400$ machine and a 5-600$ machine, not some crazy gamer rig with bleeding edge components.
Does this really make any kind of sense to you?
The point of faster hardware is to do *MORE*, not just the same thing faster. Resources are there to be USED not sit around idle.
People don’t go buy a PS3 or Xbox360 so they can play Pacman *REALLY* fast. They get it because the new/cool games eat up more resources than the older games.
Kasi expounded…
Which is why I would expect my PS3, Xbox360 or any other such console to load itself as quickly and efficiently as possible, then get out of the way so I can play the game. The resources are intended to be used all right–by the game or application! not so Vista can preen around the screen asking me every five minutes whether or not it is pretty…
–bornagainpenguin
Its an operating system not an application. Modern operating systems shouldn’t (and Windows competitors don’t) need a gig of RAM to boot fast, run fast or move files fast.
If an operating system needs a gig of RAM to do this (and many don’t), how can you expect games, office software and other applications on it to run as smoothly as possible? Debian Lenny will whup Windows 7.
Edited 2009-01-04 21:50 UTC
Irrelevant performance numbers of pre-release software again? For god’s sake: those numbers / comparisons are useless (unless you are an engineer working on said software and need those numbers for performance regression testing).
Publishing such comparisons / numbers is pure marketing:
– Vista was slow so till Win7 is release MS marketing will tell us that Win7 will be much faster..
– Vista had rough edges so MS marketing will tell us that Win7 will be much smother..
– The iPhone touch interface was a success so MS marketing tell us that Win7 will have an even better touch interface..
– IE is loosing market share so MS marketing will tell us that IE 8 will be a winner ..
– etc. etc..
.. and a hoard of MS fangirls will thankfully hype (yet another) Windows version. Funny that they don’t get it: Calling version x+1 “soooo much better” is admitting that version x (which they hyped, too) was in fact a piece of junk ..
Ok, time to look at it fairly: at what version did Linux and all the associated user space software (X, Gnome, KDE, things people see that they most associate with “the computer” for non-geeks) reach their pinnacle of perfection, and why on earth do they bother coming out with newer versions? For fairness, Mac OSX, Solaris, other Unix implementations, etc. all have this, too. The non-embedded Linux that we see today does not use as little or less in the way of resources than the Linux I used back in 1995: does this mean that it sucks more? By your logic, absolutely!
Well – there is always room for improvement, but there is a big difference. It is free software…
No, no, no … I am not going to say it is better because it is free or that kind of stuff. I mean there is no “financial market” that has to be won, so Linux and associated applications do not need the “next version is better” propaganda. Linux does not need to sell itself, simply because it is free. Windows is NOT free, so it has to be pushed to the people. Do not forget a lot of people have just bought Vista and are not very happy to spend a lot of money in a short time again. They have to be “prepared” with wonderful story’s about lightning fast software that is really, really, really worth to spend a lot of money on again…
Do not forget a lot of the so called “next version is better” propaganda is also designed to prohibiting choice. It tries to fool people. It tries to give those people the idea that if they just wait a little while they will get a perfect “heaven on earth” operating system. This propaganda is designed to put people in a “hold” mode and do not investigate in- and/or deploy other options (read: operating systems).
This tests do not give hard facts. They only give a few test on a not representative hardware platform with a not finished and fully developed operating system. At best it is only a rough indication where the software is heading. By no means it is a test with a finished product on most commonly used hardware.
And that is a BIG difference…
Do not be fooled by marketing speak. Wait until there is a really finished product tested on some commonly hardware. That’s the moment for reality and hard facts. All other stuff is just speculation and marketing speak…
*blink*
…you can’t be serious. You can’t look me straight in the face and say this without bursting out in laughter.
There is no financial market to win for the Linux operating system ITSELF. The OS by itself is free, so no gains here.
There is a market and support for closed source applications (like Maya, and Softimage XSI etc.). There is also a market for a few non-free distro’s with commercial software and/or payed support. There is also a market for Linux as base platform to run special custum made solutions. But -again- it is the solution that is making money – not the platform itself.
There is a market for Linux running on things like notebooks and associated hardware, and again – it is the hardware that is been sold. Not Linux itself.
That is the reason it is extremely difficult to really know how much penetration Linux has in company’s and institutions. With windows you just have to count every sold copy (i am not talking about the consumer market here – I know there are a lot of not-legal copy’s around). With Linux it is impossible to determinate the total deployment, because sold copy’s (like the ones I explained above) only count for a fraction of the real number of installations.
So – Linux does not has to be “sold” in the way Windows as bare OS has to be sold. That’s what I mend to say. Linux is merely a platform and no market object by itself.
I can see the point you’re trying to make, but I beg to differ. Linux really does have to sell itself, but not necessarily for reasons of profit. Linux still has to fight off all the anti-FOSS FUD which has been circulated by Microsoft fanboys and other uninformed/misinformed sources. There’s still a mostly undeserved stigma about Linux which is keeping a lot of people from even considering it to be anything but some 3rd-rate, “hobbyist” OS.
Linux doesn’t have to “take over” or “win”; it’s enough that people (other than tech-types) consider it to be a serious and capable alternative.
“Linux” does not exist as a “product”, but SLE, RHEL, Ubuntu, Mandriva, etc. do. You can sell those (i.e., the service associated with them).
um… vista was trashed by virtually everyone
I don’t believe the test results will stay the same with the final version of Win7. Also, it would be good to see what happens when you install latest AV software, firewalls and anti-spyware software all running in the background. I believe the results might dramatically change.
Windows 7 might be better than XP and Vista (depending which way you look at it from) but I still don’t see myself migrating to it. I refuse to use an OS full of restrictions. I have been testing Ubuntu the last few days and I have been quite happy with it. Slowly but surely, I am moving to Linux although there are a few glitches with flash movies and WMV which I hope will be resolved.
Flash!? WMV!? Glitchy NO! Perhaps should be avoided ABSOLUTELY!?
What restrictions are those? I’m not restricted at all.
I’ll be waiting for some REAL benchmark results which can be accurately reproduced in a clean-room environment. Until then… Whatever…
I played around with build 7000 this past week. I couldn’t help but feel that Windows 7 is what Vista should have been to begin with. It made me feel like Vista was a two and a half year beta for Windows 7. The only real outward difference besides some minor reogranization of options is the improved taskbar. If you take that out of the equation Windows 7 looks like a much needed service pack to Vista. Performance is definitely improved but the whole thing leaves a bad taste in mouth considering what people put up with for two years with Vista.
A guy is hooking me up with a free copy of vista that he got at a trade show but did not need. Otherwise, I would be waiting until Windows 7 to bother upgrading from XP.
Oooh. Another article comparing benchmarks…let the flames begin! I needed something to warm me up here in the mid-west. 🙂
P.S. I didn’t read through all the comments but I’m definitely curious as to how we went from discussing benchmarks to Barrack Obama. Nevermind…I won’t ask.
I personally hope that Windows 7 will turn out to be really great.
So great that Mac users will want to install it on their Macs.
Windows 7 has a tough mission, and that is win the heart and mind of PC users and stop the decline in Windows market share.
I hope Microsoft pulls it off right.
Hmmm… I think I do not agree…
You see – think about one of the reasons why Windows 7 REALLY has to be better. Microsoft is feeling the competition!
Sure – it is just a tiny market share, but nevertheless it is there. Look at what happened to IE. Over years and years absolutely no improvements where made, just because there was no competition. Then came Firefox and things changed. Not dramatically at first, but noticeable. What happened then? In a very short time Microsoft began to improve their browser. Who benefited? The users!
Now the MAC and Linux are taken some bites out of the empire. Just tiny bits, but enough to create the same effect as with Firefox. It makes Microsoft feel a bit uncomfortable. Another big competition is their own “old” system – Windows XP. Microsoft obviously does not want to see this low acceptation rate of their new OS (I am talking about corporation environments here – the consumer almost has no choice then to accept and pay for Vista on every new machine). Result? They have to design something that is acceptable in the light of the competition. Who benefits? The user!
So – I really like to see some competition for Microsoft. I really like to see some more competition than happens today – not less. If that happens Microsoft is forced to design a product that really has to shine. The original Vista was a product designed in times when there was almost no competition. Look what happened. Is this a product users really want to have? I do not think so…
Now Microsoft feels the pressure to come out with an really improved product. Who benefits? The user!
So by all means – do not let Microsoft regain their market share. keep them on their toes a bit. The users will be the winners if this happens. And aren’t we all users here?
Try installing a decent VST Sampoler with 30+ Gb of samples on Vista and see where the OS could use some major UI performance inprovements. The UI grinds to a halt and you have to basically wait until the OS has finished file transfering before you can get decent UI response again.
Vista is nicer to look at than XP and has some better features but god, do we need to see some UI performance gains in Windows 7. MS needs to look at how BeOS performed under load and learn from it. Sure file transferes might not have been super snappy but at least you could use the computer and do other things at the same time. For Vista to suffer UI lack of response in this day and age is pathetic.
This with the samples being loaded onto a seperate Drive to the OS as well on a SATA2 system…. Bloody pathetic.
I hope Windows 7 x64 deals with this issue.
The question of computer resources has rages since computers took off.
It’s the very nature of computers both hardware and software to become more complex. If people wanted the same we would still be using DOS, or perhaps Windows 95 with 16MB RAM.
Games and Features push the computing platform forward. Yes it would be nice to find a use for that 5-10 year old computer however sometimes you just have to throw equipment away.
The PS3 has been mentioned, i agree that we want better graphics and a better experience. Games today such as Gears of War render in real time graphics far beyond what was a pre-rendered cut scene a 5 odd years ago. The xbox and PS3 both not only play games but can connect to the internet and play all manner of media. This is truly amazing, i remember the SNES and to think that you can play and store music and video.
We demand more from our OS’s, from our computers. I hear a lot of talk about grandma who just wants to write a letter, etc.. However there are far more people who want to do more with their computers. Many users now have a constant connection to the internet, with email and IM running in the background. Aswell as these services the user might be playing some music, these are considered background tasks! These tasks are running whilst the user is using their computer for a primary task such as surfing the net, completing some work (word, excel), photograph (viewing / editing).
This is just a quick idea of what a person might be using their computer for, however video editing is becoming more accessible to users, more uses have devices which connect to our computers and consume media and other information. We play games.
We then have to factor in the information we are storing. Back in the day, images were a big thing to store and were very low rez. Today we have cameras which produce incredibly high resolution photos, these need to be store on the computer, so computers have driven larger hard disks, which in themselves need to be managed. My first hard disk was 20MB, my mac has a 500GB internal and a 1TB FW External drive. We store photos, email, documents, video etc
All this boring paragraphs are trying to say is that we are doing a lot more with our computers without us really realising it. Of course the OS is gonna require more resources to do this. All OS’s MacOS, Windows and Linux will all consume more resources as features we come to expect are added.
I think Windows is shaping up to be an excellent release, for reasons i have said before and are echo’d above, competition brings out the best in Microsoft. I have always considered myself platform agonistic, i use the technology that best fits. My day job is to run a network for a company, however i haven’t seen an advantage in upgrading to Vista, however i find Windows 2008 server to be an excellent upgrade over 2003 with plenty of features to justify the cost. I believe by the time Windows 7 is released, our current machines will have reached the end of their useful life so an upgrade to the new features and stability of 7 looks right, so purchasing new machines which will be Windows 7 ready (i hope the OEM’s won’t make the Vista ready mistake).
The article doesn’t give any evidence whatsoever that Windows 7 is faster than Vista or XP in any way that can be accurately verified. This is yet another extremely poor ZDNet article posted here to try and tell us how great Windows 7 is. The article is two pages and he gives them scores at the end! WTF?
You really need to stop posting this meaningless crap up Thom. People will think you have an agenda or something.
Thank God we will always have you to provide us with objective and level headedness segedunum.
LOLZ. That guy is such a tool. Think Niedermeyer, in Animal House.
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